Zero Elida Schogt

Canadian documentary filmmaker Elida Schogt uses mathematical and sociological concepts of the number zero to tell a personal story about a childhood trauma and her attempt to fill the empty void within herself and reclaim some innocence and sense of wonder. On her journey, she speaks extensively to a mathematician and a philosopher about the history of zero, travels to Mexico and India (both seen as birthplaces of zero as a concept) and delves into her own North Toronto upbringing, which holds the dark secret that spawned her lifelong battle with emptiness. Schogt has a great visual flair, shooting her interviews with grace and subtle humour, and illustrating the complex mathematical and philosophical concepts she's grappling with particularly well. The facts and history she presents surrounding zero are fascinating, taking inspiration presumably from Charles Seife's wonderful book Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea. She tells her childhood story in the third person, which has a distancing effect and the personal component doesn't always seem to connect with the ideas in the rest of the film. That said, Schogt's film is quite successful as a meditation on her own, and the world's, relationship with the void. (GAT)